Saturday, October 17, 1981
Left the Personalhaus at 7:00 to begin my mini Eurail Pass vacation. Caught
the 8:17 train to Geneva and for the first time sat in First Class. I had a 15-day
Eurail Pass, and when you no longer qualify for the Youth Pass, you go First
Class!
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| Eurail Pass |
I had a single seat by the window and the seat was wide and well-cushioned.
Watched the misty lakes fly by and noted the grapes had been harvested.
Arrived in Geneva about 10:25. Had a McDonald’s lunch of a hamburger,
French fries, and a chocolate shake. There was construction around the train
station. It looked like men were using blowtorches to melt strips of asphalt
onto the road (?). Waved through customs and stood to wait for the train. The
French locomotive also waited. The train came in at 11:30, and then we were on
our way at 11:33! The red Talgo train is unusual-looking with low squat
articulated cars. It is Spanish and tilts on curves to allow faster speeds
through curves, introduced in 1980.
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| Geneva to Barcelona reservation |
The seats in First Class were cloth-upholstered and had white
antimacassars. There was a pair of seats on one side of the aisle and a single
on the other, like in Swiss First Class. But here all the seats faced forward
except the very first row that faced backward. My seat was the single backwards
seat. The seat in front of me was reserved from Geneva to Barcelona, but remained
empty. I switched seats so I could face forward. Passed a clay-grey river
backed by mountains; I think we were following the Rhône River all the way! Saw
olive groves, then vineyards. The landscape seemed boring as I realized I
missed the mountains! Passengers came and went as we traveled through France.
Only one woman who boarded at Lyon crossed into Spain with me. At the last
French station, a man in jeans and a sweater vest came asking for passports.
Not very official!
As we crossed into Spain, I was trying to see if I could feel the wheels
adjust to a different gauge, another feature of the Talgo. At the first station
in Spain, Port Bou, a pair of men came through to stamp passports and another
pair of men came to ask what was in our baggage. I couldn’t tell them in French
or Spanish, so just responded in English. They said, “OK,” and went on. A guy
sitting a row back heard me struggling with my English, and asked me if he
needed a reservation. He had a U.S. passport and was from Dallas and Los Angeles.
He was a flight attendant who had interviewed in Geneva for a job with a Saudi
prince. He has traveled extensively, and his airfare for this trip was a measly
$17. He had been in a car accident and
had some revolutionary surgery for crushed vertebrae, using springs to assist
vertebral extension (some Swiss idea). A look at Eurail Passes was how we
exchanged names.
Gary W was not sure what he was going to do once we arrived in
Barcelona. He decided to continue to Madrid which was what I was doing. The
train arrived on time at 21:00 in Barcelona. We went together to the ticket
windows, and as usual I went to the wrong one. We were sent to window #6. We
learned there were no more seats, but there were cuchette sleepers. So we paid
the 1100 Spanish pesetas (ESP)/$11.50 and ended up sharing a double.
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| Barcelona to Madrid cuchette/sleeper ticket |
Gary hadn’t eaten dinner, so we went in search of food. He started off with
an ice cream bar! We ended up at a bar across the street from the station, and
chose our meals from pictures in the window. It took them a while to serve the
meal, but only a few minutes for Gary to down the steak and fries, rice and
sliced tomatoes, green salad, and he was given more bread after eating all the
bread we were first given. We had to rush to our 22:00 train to Madrid. Fortunately
our cuchette cabin was in the end car, the first one we approached. Gary ran into a
girl he had met before in his travels and this was the third time they had run
into each other!
Our cuchette cabin had two bunks and each had a reading light and night light. There
was a bottle and a drinking glass holder, a stringed pocket, and a hook with
padding below it. Gary guessed that was where you hung your reading glasses.
There was a phone by each bed but they could not be unhooked. The “medicine”
cabinet had a carafe of water, two glasses, a small bar of black soap, a tube
of toothpaste and a couple hand towels. A round table in the corner opened up
to reveal a sink! A cabinet below the sink opened up to reveal a possible
chamber pot! There was a room light, mirror light, air conditioning, and a menu
(room service?). A window shade, fold-up seat for two, and a ladder for
climbing into the bunks, although we couldn’t figure out where it was supposed
to go. I found written instructions the next morning for the ladder. All in
all, a fascinating little space.
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| Gary at the sink |
We turned out the lights to go to sleep, but outdoor lights kept flashing
by as the train swayed. Eventually fell asleep.
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